Bless Me, Father
by Beyond the Bedroom
Summary: Bella is completely obsessed with the very attractive Edward Cullen, which is inconvenient since he's also the town priest.


**Title:** Bless Me, Father

 **Summary:** Bella is completely obsessed with the very attractive Edward Cullen, which is inconvenient since he's also the town priest.

 **Pairing:** Bella/Edward

 **Rating:** M

 **Disclaimer:** Twilight and its inclusive material is copyright to Stephenie Meyer. Original creation, including but not limited to plot and character, is copyright to the respective authors of each story. No copyright infringement is intended.

* * *

 **Bless Me, Father**

Bella was quite certain that she was going to Hell.

To begin with, she wasn't Catholic - or even religious - but here she was attending the Christmas midnight mass and for all the wrong reasons.

She did her best to focus on the liturgy and young Father Cullen's words, but her thoughts continually veered to other things. On this particular evening, she was noticing how lovely his eyes were, how the glow of the surrounding candles made them look a darker shade of green than usual. His long lashes cast shadows across his sculpted cheekbones. His voice was a deep tenor, easily floating across the room, and though she couldn't understand a word of the Latin that he was chanting, she imagined that he was actually speaking to her in a language that only they understood:

 _I love you, Bella,_

Be with me, Bella,

Run away with me to some small island and let's make babies together.

In that instant, his dark green eyes locked briefly with her own, and she looked down, embarrassed with herself. Heat flooded her face, and though the sanctuary was frigid this evening for the Christmas mass, she felt like a furnace had been lit inside her face. Father Cullen halted for a moment, and she felt his gaze on her even after she had looked away. She wanted to bury herself inside the hard wooden pew that she had been sitting on for the last half hour.

When he began again, he faltered. She found it unnerving that he'd even noticed her at all.

It was a game she played every Sunday that she attended, which was becoming a regular habit. The compulsion to be near him seemed to get stronger with each passing week. It was horrible and completely inappropriate, not to mention downright irrational, but deep in the recesses of her soul, something inside her recognized that she needed him. Just being in the same room with him gave her an odd peace.

Maybe it was because he was attractive, though out of bounds, and somehow safe.

Maybe it was because she was a first-class idiot who never wanted anything that was good for her.

It didn't help at all that she lived right next door to him, two blocks away in the more run-down portion of downtown Forks. When her father died, she inherited his debt and was forced to sell his house. In one of the more difficult moments of dealing with life without him, she'd stumbled into the only Catholic Church in the small town of Forks. After that first sighting, she was completely undone - and then she ran into him everywhere: the grocery store, the library where she worked, the park… but here was the only place that she could actually watch him without looking like the stalker that she had become.

If she'd ever had the opportunity to say the things to him out loud that she thought inside her own head, she would have died. In reality, Bella Swan was a terrible prude. The stereotypical librarian who wore buttoned up shirts with cardigans and skirts that reached her mid-calf. She had never been interested in any real life man romantically and preferred to fantasize about men such as Heathcliff and Darcy.

However, when she first set eyes on him, it was as if all of the angst- ladened hormones that she should have experienced when she was younger all came to the surface at once. He was everything she'd ever wanted in a man. And much like the men in her favorite romance novels, as well as all of the perfectly, beautiful gay men of the world, Father Edward Cullen was completely unavailable.

So unavailable, that only God had his number.

Therefore, a perfect obsession for one, screwed up, Bella Swan.

Wildfire was only slightly faster than the gossip that raged through their small town. Two months after Edward Cullen arrived, his story was told from the bank teller to the gas station attendant. Every mom in the car, pick up line, and every kid as a result who visited Bella's library had a story to tell about Father Edward Cullen. It turned out, he was a survivor, who spent his childhood in a foster home for boys until he was eighteen. He had been one of the youngest men to join the church, and they'd sent him to the Olympic Peninsula and the small town of Forks because - quite frankly - no one else wanted to go. It was the second, least -desired parish short of Alaska.

Father Cullen reached across the dark wood of the tall table in front of him, and she shifted her thoughts, focusing instead on his long fingers as they lit another candle. The light flickered across his brow, highlighting his odd hair, making it look less coppery red and more dark brown. From her angle so close to the front, she could almost see the few scars that marred his otherwise perfect skin. They were shiny, jagged lines that glimmered in the waving candlelight, one that disappeared beneath his right eyebrow and another that touched his full top lip. She'd fantasized about kissing those small scars, placing her hands into his thick mop of hair and kissing each individual one, starting with his brow and working her way down to...other places.

She sighed quietly and looked down at her hands, ashamed of herself. She fidgeted her numb backside against the hard pew and waited for lightning to strike her dead.

It was ridiculous.

She was ridiculous.

She wasn't even a member of this church.

His name used to be Edward.

 _Edward._

She smiled to herself. It was an old-fashioned, romantic name, something you would find in an Austen novel or ... a movie about a guy with scissors for hands who gave women terrible haircuts. She giggled to herself and smiled apologetically at the elderly lady in front of her who glared back at her disapprovingly.

She straightened and redirected her thoughts toward the front. Edward - _Father Cullen_ \- lifted a glass full of wine and continued chanting in his beautiful, melodic voice.

 _Would you like some wine, my sweet Bella?_

Only if I get to lick it from your beautiful, naked body, dear Edward.

He faltered, and some drops slipped over the side, staining the white tablecloth beneath it. She frowned thinking it an odd moment for that to have happened. Just when she was thinking of how perfect he must be under all those robes, how his warm skin would feel beneath her fingertips.

His voice quavered, and it took him a few moments to fall back into the soft ebb and flow of the Latin that he surely knew by heart. His eyes shifted over to her once more, glaring.

Her blood ran cold. She watched him for a few seconds, her eyes wide and mind numb. A nervous, whispering laugh escaped her lips.

She had finally cracked up.

She was losing her mind.

In that brief moment, she could swear that he knew what she was thinking and was silently chastising her for it. Of course, she knew that couldn't be true. If Father Cullen could have read minds, he would have kicked her out already - long ago. She was such an idiot. Of course, she couldn't just let such a fabulous idea slip through her fingers, even if it was just a fluke. As ludicrous as it seemed, she had to test her insane theory:

 _Quick, think of something!_

 _His hands on my back as he lays me down on the floor._

He gave no reaction, but _she_ was suddenly getting very hot.

 _Our bodies entwined him inside me, slowly moving in and out._

Still nothing.

She tried again.

 _Cock_

 _Pussy_

 _Balls_

 _Scarecrow.  
_  
The corner of his mouth turned up slightly.

 _Holy shit!_

 _I mean, Holy crow!  
_  
It wasn't appropriate to curse in church, after all, not that **it** mattered after all the other things she'd been thinking. She looked around frantically as if the other people in the room could see what just went on inside her own head.

 _There is a logical explanation for this: It is finally time to commit Bella Swan. I wonder if the people with the padded rooms do pickups. What number do you call for that type of service? Do you have to tip the driver?_

He seemed to smirk slightly once more.

No. She was imaging this. After all, no matter what vile or ridiculous thoughts went through her head, he had no reaction before, and he had always acted as though she wasn't there at all.

And also, PEOPLE CAN'T READ MINDS!

He had probably noticed the way she'd looked at him. Of course, that was it. She had always been a terrible liar, it made perfect sense that her face would be like an open book when she was constantly staring at him. She could feel her skin flushing. This had been a mistake. She had to finally let this insane infatuation go, move on, ogle someone else, stop following in this very definition of madness. As the service finally ended, she stood in the aisle waiting impatiently for everyone else to leave so that she could escape the back way. Some people stood to her left, blocking her exit, forcing her to walk toward the large double doors in the front of the sanctuary, where she'd have to walk right past him.

She sucked in a breath and walked forward on shaky legs, trying her hardest to feign a confidence she didn't feel. An unexplainable, gripping pain seized her when she realized this would be the last time she'd see him here. She would never attend another service - never darken these doors. She would stop being such an idiot and find herself a real life. She would stop being weird and start dating someone. Anyone. All of these things were just common sense, so why did they make her feel like crying?

The walk to the large double doors seemed to last an eternity, and also came too soon. Somehow, she was the last person to walk by him. She watched everyone else leave the building to go on with their normal lives; with family and friends while she, the crazy cat lady with no cats, was about to heartbreakingly say a silent, final goodbye to a man who she was quite certain that she was in love with.

She was completely certifiable.

And then she was standing directly in front of him, his hair shining like a bronze halo on top of his head.

 _Good_ _meets Bad._

 _Light meets Dark._

 _God and The Devil._

"Can I shake your hand, Bella?"

She startled, surprised that he remembered her name, and realized that he was holding his hand out, as he did every Sunday to say goodbye to parishioners who were leaving. She was somewhat afraid to have him touch her, afraid that she would taint him somehow, afraid of how she would react to finally feeling his skin on her own. Afraid that the memory of that feeling would haunt her.

She looked at his hand for a moment too long before finally reaching out and placing hers in it, and once she did, she regretted her decision. His long fingers wrapped around hers and it was equally comforting and unsettling, causing something in the pit of her stomach to flip. Her hand felt like it belonged in his. The heat from his seemed to warm everything inside her. She shook his hand and gave a slight smile that she didn't feel. She expected him to let go quickly and let her leave, just as he did for every other person who shook his hand to leave for the night. Her eyes swelled with tears, and she hated herself for becoming weepy in front of him.

He leaned in close, and she could swear he smelled her hair. His breath tickled her ear as he whispered, "Come home with me."

She stared at him, open-mouthed and she felt a tear slip from her eye onto her cheek, and he wiped it away with his thumb.

"Wha-"

His head dipped, and his lips were suddenly on hers. She squeaked against his mouth and in response, he wrapped his warm hands - the ones she had just been staring at minutes ago - on the small of her back, pulling her closer. Afraid to touch him, afraid she would taint him with her wickedness, she kept her hands to her sides, hanging somewhat in midair to avoid his arms that were around her. His lips moved softly over hers. It was intimate and sweet. She didn't kiss him back, and her thoughts were screaming through her head like a freight train.

 _His lips are so soft._

This is wrong.

I want this.

I can't do this.

I would ruin him, and he would hate me.

What kind of a whore tries to seduce a priest?

 _He knows what I'm thinking. How can he know what I'm thinking?  
_

She painfully backed out of his reach, her entire body shaking, and looked out into the night at the darkened parking lot where no one was there to see them. Everyone had left and gone home.

They were there alone.

Freezing rain had begun to fall and coat the already slick cement, and she barely felt the cold air as it blew through the open door, still reeling from the feeling of his lips on hers, his hands on her back.

 _Take off your clothes._

She shocked herself with the thought and gasped, pushing herself even farther away from him.

His eyes grew wide, and he swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing slightly in his throat as her cheeks flamed with embarrassment. After a long moment of looking into her eyes, he said, "Take off _your_ clothes."

The words floated through the otherwise silent room. She shuddered and quietly obeyed, right there in the open doorway, with the frigid wind and sleet falling in over her skin. She removed her over-sized sweater with shaking fingers, then slowly unbuttoned her dress shirt. Before she could push her long skirt down below her hips, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her through the open doors and onto the sidewalk toward their homes.

She walked to her small apartment and fumbled with the keys that she'd pulled from her large skirt pocket, struggling to control her shaking emotions and hands.

 _This is happening._

How is this happening?

He reached around her, warm and confident, and wrapped his hand around hers. Guiding the key to the lock, he gently wrapped his other arm around her, steadying her as he pushed it inside and helped turn it. The barrels clicked, and a shaky breath escaped her.

This is it. There was no going back after this.

He leaned forward, his hot breath against her neck, his body so much closer than he'd ever been before. She felt his chest, warm against her back. He removed his hand from the key, leaned forward and swept her hair away from her neck, replacing it with his lips. Her eyes closed in response.

"Open the door, Isabella."

The assertive tone of his voice and the use of her full name was the final turning point. Every doubt and fear left her head and she could only think of how much she wanted him. She saw a brief flicker of something likening joy in his eyes as she turned her body fully to his and wrapped her arms around his neck, burying her fingers in his hair at the same time that she pressed her lips against his.

He moaned softly, and a tidal wave of need flooded all of her senses. She released one hand from his thick hair to fumble awkwardly behind her to open the door. Once they were inside, he quickly pushed it shut, locking it behind them, never once breaking their kiss.

The lights and heat were off in the dark, cramped room, but she could only feel the warmth from his kisses, and the heat from his hands that had begun to freely roam over her back and sides. He pulled her blouse from her body and skimmed his fingers across her skin causing her to shudder. His breath fanned against her face and said, "I want to take you slowly. Next time."

Buttons danced across the hardwood floor as he ripped the rest of her shirt from her and threw it into a corner of the room. She gasped and watched as a wicked smile crept up from his lips to his eyes. His perfect teeth gleamed in the dull light, as her thin undershirt and bra quickly followed.

"No one has ever said that to me before," he said, laughing softly, and she realized that she'd just thought, _You are so bad._

She pressed against him, desperate to get closer. He removed his hands and arms from her just long enough to strip out of his clothing and throw it all onto a heap on her living room floor. With the threads and cloth gone, he stood before her, just a man - a naked, beautiful man. She stopped to appreciate him for a brief moment before he was on her again, hot breath and soft lips. HIs hands roamed her skin, delicate, yet insistent touches setting fire to every area that he touched until her entire body was a living, breathing flame.

She was more hesitant, afraid that every touch, every stroke of his skin would eventually make him come to his sense, make him push her hands away and tell her it was that this was wrong, that they needed to stop.

He growled into her hair and picked her up, plopping her gently onto her couch. Before she could catch her breath, he was on top of her, his naked skin a comforting heat. He snuggled himself between her thighs and moved her hair to whisper hotly into her ear, "All I want to do right now is to fuck you. You're feeling so much guilt for the both of us." With an aching hot pulse, the feel of his cock slightly throbbing between her thighs, he said, "I just want to fuck you. Just you. For the rest of my life. Stop thinking. Just let yourself feel. My Isabella. Please. Please, just let me be with you."

He claimed her lips with his own, and she gasped and moaned against him. The fever between them grew brighter as his hands sought to touch all of her at once. She never wanted this to end, this bliss, this heat. She realized as his hands roamed slowly down from her breasts to the apex of her thighs, that this was the first time in a very long time that he had felt another's touch, another's warmth. She wanted to make this worth it for him. That thought sent a moan from him against her mouth.

The only sound that could be heard in the room was of their lips meeting again and again. She forced her fingers from his soft hair to slowly stroke his neck, and then his back, where she hesitated once she reached the small of it. She heard his disappointed sigh as her hands paused slightly above his backside. In response, she stroked his sides, placing her hands between them to reach for him. He was hard beneath the soft skin, and they both gasped as she wrapped her hand around him and gently began to stroke.

"Oh, God, Bella." he panted as she found more confidence and added her other hand to place behind his shaft.

A long moment passed as she caressed him, watching him move back and forth against her hands, his eyes closed.

Finally, he moved her hands gently away from him and positioned himself above her.

"Isabella, "he said gently,as he moved her tangled hair away from her face. "If you want me to stop, tell me now."

She stared at his green eyes, his copper hair, his lips, his tautjaw, and thought.

 _Fuck me._

 _Now_.

He groaned and was suddenly everywhere, all at once. HIs hands were buried in her hair, roaming along her back, her front, between her legs. He removed a hand from her swollen sex just long enough to grip himself to enter her. Once the tip of his shaft was slightly inside her, she moaned and pulled him closer, desperate for more of him ...for all of him.

Teasingly, he entered her only slightly, just enough to get the feel of him only to lean back and leave her void. After doing this a few times, she shoved against his shoulders, pushing him back until she had gained dominance, dragging her body over his on her small couch. The springs creaked beneath them as she leaned forward and whispered against his face, "I said, now."

She gripped him gently, guiding him to her entrance and then lowered herself onto him. The feeling of him inside her, filling all of her so completely made her moan. Her face and chest flushed as he watched her. She was hesitant at first, only moving slowly up and down, her hands pressed against his chest as she dug her fingertips slightly into his skin.

She couldn't read his mind as he could hers, but the way that he looked at her, with complete adoration and desire, made her bolder. Her legs spread further apart, one only slightly inconvenienced by the inside of the sofa as she moved with more purpose. Up and down. Slow and hard, as she took him further into her with each downward stroke. The tip of his cock brushed against a place deep inside her. She sighed and shuddered, leaning forward to feel more of it, more of him, fueled on by his constant sighs and soft moans, by the whisper of her name.

But she needed more.

Before she could suggest it, she was on her back on the carpeted floor with him above her. He bent her knees as far as they would go and teased her by entering her slowly several times before he finally pressed himself fully against her, his cock buried deep inside her. A long, excruciating moment passed while he buried his fingers into her hair and whispered her name. She realized he wanted her to look athim. She opened her eyes and gasped at the wonder and love that shown in his as he looked down at her.

"Stop thinking. Just feel."

Then he began to move softly, slowly, the ridge of his cock gliding softly against her, inside her. It was everything. He was everything. He moved softly, teasing her, making her squirm and sigh, until she couldn't bear it any longer. Then he began to move with purpose, pressing himself into her and at the same time, against her, causing friction and fullness in the places she needed it the most.

She could no longer think, but could only feel. The pleasure of his strokes filled her senses, and she moved against him, silently begging for more. His soft breaths and moans against her neck further moved her on as his hands buried themselves once more in her long hair as if they belonged there. His hands belonged in her hair, and he belonged inside her.

He claimed her lips with his own as he began and she felt him losing control, his thrusts changed from concise and slow to erratic.

"Bella...oh, Isabella."

The sound of her name on his lips, the feel of his cock moving inside her sensitive skin, his skin slowly moving across her sensitive nub, all at once brought on a sudden sensation through her that began between her legs and quickly covered her entire body. She gripped his hair, moaning loudly against his neck, not even caring that she would normally be embarrassed by the sound.

He responded in kind, gripping her shoulders, his hands searching for purchase anywhere that he could grab her. He called out her name, and she gripped him with her inner walls as he came; she clutched his shoulders, loved and caressed him with her entire body.

The room slowly came into focus as the electricity that surged between them slowly fizzled and crackled and disappeared as the cold, stark realization of the sin she had just committed, and the loud sounds of their breath filled the room.

He leaned up on his elbows, pressed his hands against her face, and brushed away the tears that fell from the corners of her eyes away.

"Isabella. I love you."

Be with me, Bella," he kissed her nose, and she laughed, knowing that he was repeating her thoughts from before, in the church. Her heart pounded in herchest as she knew which words were coming next and she clamped a hand over his mouth.

"Please don't," she said.

I'm not quite ready for all of that.

He laughed, "Well…" he kissed her lips. "It looks as if the running away part might be a good idea. Are you ready to be the scandal of Forks? Because I have no intention of letting you spend one more night alone - on this couch - without me. And I have no intention of spending my entire life alone, without you."

She could feel her face flush as she projected every adoring thought toward him that she'd ever had.

He kissed her hard, wrapping his strong arms around her, pinning her to the cushions. When she was completely out of breath, he said, "Also, about those other thoughts of yours…"

Oh, God.

"I'd like to definitely try out that one thing you were thinking about last week with you on the bookshelf."

OH, GOD!

"It's official," she said jovially, but the thought of it hurt her heart, "I have ruined you."

He lifted her hand and kissed the back of it. "No, Bella. I spent so many years completely alone: from an abusive home, to a boys' home, to several foster homes. The only solace I had ever found was in the church, with its old dusty walls and stained glass windows - much the same way that your library has been a sanctuary for you.

I was just eighteen when I joined the church, young and naive and with a somewhat jaded outlook on the world. For a long time, I was content in my quiet, uncomplicated life. I was content in my loneliness and my vows of celibacy. And then, two years ago, you walked into my church and turned my world upside down.

But please, please, dear Bella. Never think that you've _ruined_ me. You have made me whole.  
His voice broke on the last word, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, silently vowing to never leave him and to cherish him. She stopped once she realized that she was beginning to recite a wedding vow.

He was kind enough to not say anything about that.

"So…" he said, an eyebrow raised, "About that bookshelf."

She smacked his arm playfully and laughed, "Maybe later. I am far more courageous and bold inside my own head than I am in real life."

He smiled at her. "I guess we'll just have to see about that. My Bella."

"So, as I was saying…" he picked her up and flung her over his shoulder, quickly carrying her to her small bedroom where he flopped her down unceremoniously on the messy bed covers.

"Bella, I love you."

He skimmed her neck with his nose, breathing her in and ran his hands down her side. He kissed her lips and gathered her up with his other arm, pressing them flush against each other where she could feel their hearts pounding together as one.

"Bella, be with me forever."

She silently agreed as she moved her hand between them to place it over his heart.

 _Forever._

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